EUROPE : In Mean Streets of N. Ireland, Killings Beget More Killings

In the mean streets of West Belfast, the vicious cycle of violence and tension is on the upsurge again: killings followed by funerals followed by more killings.

The latest outbreak of mayhem in long-troubled Northern Ireland was sparked by a bomb set off last weekend by an Irish Republican Army volunteer attempting to blow up a meeting of leaders of the Ulster Freedom Fighters. Thomas Begley, 22, was killed by his own bomb, his confederate badly wounded; nine Protestant residents of Belfast’s Shankill Road area, including women and children, were killed.

Protestant paramilitary groups wasted little time striking back, killing Roman Catholics at random. Now, 17 people have been killed and more than 60 injured. Many residents of West Belfast are afraid to open their doors for fear of being singled out in the mindless sectarian violence.

Thus, the bitterness and anxiety have intensified, despite the presence of 20,000 British troops and 12,000 police.

The Protestant and Catholic dead and wounded are not the only victims of the latest grim round: A fragile peace plan being worked out on the republican side appears to have been doomed.

The accord was being negotiated in secret for six months by John Hume, leader of the mainly Catholic, moderate Social Democratic and Labor Party, and Gerry Adams, head of Sinn Fein, the political arm of the IRA.

The aim, Hume has said, was to work out a joint policy on behalf of Ulster’s Catholic republicans. It would then be presented to the British and Irish governments as a basis for an overall settlement to the long-running “troubles.” During the period, the IRA would observe a cease-fire.

But after the bombing, Prime Minister John Major declared: “I am not going to do deals with people who plant bombs and kill innocent people.”

He added: “There will be more deaths, more misery and more years before Northern Ireland can have the peaceful democratic future that everyone wishes to see.”

The British and Irish governments, along with Ulster Protestants, have been conducting their own on-again, off-again talks with little success.

The core of the problem remains constant: Ulster’s half a million Catholics want unification with Ireland, or at least some form of self-government; the province’s 1 million Protestants refuse to be ruled by Dublin and insist on maintaining union with Britain.

That problem has led the IRA to pursue violence as a policy; it has been met with similar reaction from the Protestant paramilitary forces. In all, 3,000 people have been killed in the area since 1969.

Whatever slender possibilities the Hume-Adams talks had for success were further jeopardized when Adams showed up at Begley’s funeral and helped carry the coffin, draped in the Irish flag and topped with a black beret and gloves--IRA emblems.

The Rev. Ian Paisley, the militant Ulster Protestant leader, declared: “The fact that he carried the coffin means he has associated himself with the crime. Hume and Adams must end their talks. As long as they go on, the IRA will increase blackmail on the government and there will be reaction from the Protestant community.”

Many commentators argue that Adams, in the face of a major bomb blast by the IRA, was clearly shown to have lost authority over the IRA, and consequently any agreements he might make would be worthless.

For his part, Hume promised to keep negotiating.

“Should we stop talking because of atrocities?” he asked. “Or should we accelerate the process of talking?”

Major conferred with Irish Prime Minister Albert Reynolds on Friday at the European Community summit conference in Brussels.

Reynolds reportedly presented Major with a framework of principles for new talks between Protestant and Catholic leaders. A key element of the plan is to bring Northern Ireland’s “men of violence” into negotiations for the first time if they lay down their arms. And Irish Foreign Minister Dick Spring revealed that Dublin might be prepared to drop its constitutional claim to the north but stressed that no changes could be made in Northern Ireland’s status without the consent of a majority of its citizens.